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STABLE MANAGEMENT ESSAY CONTEST  Welcome to the first annual "It Can Only Happen on the Farm" contest. This year we asked you, our readers, to send us a funny story about life on the farm. We received some hilarious tales of horses, clients and machinery gone bad. Thank you to all those you sent in stories! CONTEST WINNERS: Below are the top three picks for 2009. 1st place winner will receive a $50 gift certificate to SmartPak Equine, an engraved ipod shuffle and a logo'd Stable Management hat. Runners up receive a $25 gift certificate to SmartPak Equine along with a logo'd Stable Management hat. 2010 Contest: Please submit entries to liz@stable-management.com by November 5, 2010. Stories should not exceed one page in length. All equine professionals of any discipline are welcome to enter. First Place Winner: Runner Up: One Lesson I'll Never Forget Submitted by: Stillrbook Riding Stable, Ontario Canada When taking lessons at our stable, riders are taught three parts of the horses body each week until they can name them all. One young girl had learned many of the common parts so we were on to harder ones like ergot, stifle, etc. One lesson she arrived with quite a group of spectators. She had her parents, grand parents and a few others with her and was very proud to show off her knowledge of the horse. As she was grooming she stated proudly that she remembered her new words from last week. She pointed out the first two and then shouted "and now I'll show you the nuts!" The grandparents nearly fainted, the mother looked horrified, the dad smirked and I quickly spoke up while biting the inside of my cheek so not to laugh, "you mean the Chestnuts don't you?" She accuratey pointed out the chestnuts and the lesson continued with a sigh of relief! I do think of this often and chuckle! Runner Up: Miss Model Submitted by: A5A Farm, Ohio Owning a small training facility whose speciality is starting young horses and retraining problem horses, we see a variety of horses and owners from many equine disciplines. One particular client, a young women with straight white teeth, a dazzling smile, beautiful hair, and perfectly manicured nails brought her Impressive 3 year old bred halter mare to be trained for saddle work. Both horse and owner looked like they just stepped out of a horse magazine advertisement and I thought I was in big trouble. Now, for those of you who do not know, Impressive bred Quarter Horses are usually drop dead gorgeous but generally come with some peculiarities. This little mare was no exception. Over time, we got this mare working pretty well under saddle and ready for the owner to start taking over some of the riding and training responsibilities. After one particularly hard, hot, dirty training session the owner and horse started to work real well together. To say that I was relieved would be a gross understatement. Watching my magazine model owner finally riding her diva horse, I could not deny a feeling of hard earned pride on a job well done. Fishing for a compliment, I looked up at my client and I, "Man, it sure doesn't get much better than this." Looking down from her horse, wearing a riding helmet, a sweaty shirt and sporting a newly broken fingernail, Miss Model looks me square in the eye and replies, "Ann, you really do need to get out more." 2009 Entries 1. My daughter, raised on a horse farm all her life was only 7 years old. She was watching me instruct new horse owners around 14 years of age how to clean their gelding's sheeth, which she had seen me do over the years. As the girls began to giggle and laugh, my daughter with a serious face asked," whats so funny, that's how boy horses wear theirs, hanging down, and girl horses wear theirs flat." Only a farm kid would see it that way. - Ashley Acres Appaloosas, New Jersey 2. Aziza Star is a purebred black Arabian mare, who in addition to her show schedule, attends parades, community service events, and even movie premiers. We accompany her to many events where she is greeted by people who have never been close to, or even touched, a real horse. As an ambassador, "Z" stands for pictures and petting for hours while we answer questions from visitors. Sometimes it is extremely hard to keep a straight face when answering these very serious inquiries, many of which come from adults! We have kept little journals of Z's travels and made notes of the questions asked about Z, and here are the top 5 questions: 1. Does she eat meat? 2. Is she The Black Stallion? 3. Can she lay down? 4. What are her feet made out of? 5. Can she run? - Aziza Star Arabians, Ohio 3. This recently happened at our small family boarding stable. A lady of approximately 60 years bought her first horse ever. She immediately had trouble lifting the horses feet for cleaning. Someone told her it helps to lift the leg by pinching the horse's chestnuts. She later told us she did not try that procedure and said "besides, he is a gelding." We had a good laugh at her expense. - Shamrock Boarding Stables, Michigan 4. Over the years, we have had several boarders who have gotten behind in thier monthly board. After letters and phone calls, most of them caught up on the accounts. However, we had one boarder with an old buckskin horse that got several months behind. He owned a septic pumping business and offered to trade his services for mine. Having a fully functioning system, I refused to trade out his bill. One night, at 10:00p.m. in the evening, while sitting at the dining room table, the dogs started barking at something outside. As we watched, the boarder crept by the dining room window, not 20-feet from us, leading the old horse down and the driveway. We didn't try to stop him because we knew he would never pay anyway, and we were better off without the expense. To this day, I'm sure he thinks he got the best of us! - Pine Crest Stables, Colorado 5. My girlfriend at the time had her children visiting us on the farm. Her Keeshound had just delivered puppies a week or so before their visit. While playing with the puppies they all decided it was time to nurse. Her daughter, about 5 years old at the time, jumps up and yells for us to stop the puppies, that they were biting their mom. "Their not biting her, their eating.." I said. Her eyes suddenly grew as big as possible for a little kid, and said "Puppies eat doggies bellies?" - Natchez Trace Stables, Mississippi 6. Back in 1969 I acquired a retired standardbred who had the disposition of a saint. "Magic Goose" had been off the track for quite a while so on a fine spring day I hooked him up to a cart and walked him out onto a quiet country road in Southwick, MA. I was not told about head checks and trotters so when I hooked the head check up to the harness I was forced to leap onto the seat as "Goosey" was already in motion. For what seemed like an eternity I laid flat back against his mouth trying to stop this normally docile horse. He trotted his way out the lane and onto the main route into Granby, CT. I saw my life flash by as cars stopped on both sides of the road to let the charging horse have way. Then, as soon as this began it was all over suddenly as he slowed to a walk. I quickly dismounted the rig, dropped his head and walked him back to the farm. On my way home I checked the distance he had trotted, it was one mile exactly, the distance he had raced at. I was informed later never to check his head as that's a cue to him that he's supposed to race. I never did again and enjoyed many "quiet" country drives. - Christine E. Goetz, New Jersey 7. My husband and I are recently new horse owners and therefore are naive and not familiar with some of their idiosyncrasies. Recently after a small flood in our basement we soaked it up with a multitude of towels and blankets. We took all our wet stuff and hung it over the fence in our back yard where it remained until we went to bed. Upon waking the next morning we discovered that sometime during the night our two horses, Takoda and Tatonka, who were not pleased with this addition to their domain proceeded to remove every wet item and scatter them all over their two acre pasture. What a mess! It took my husband nearly an hour to recover everything. We would certainly have loved to see them approaching these "scary things" during the night and after being assured these objects would not hurt them. They must have had a blast asserting their dominance and just tossing them everywhere! After all it was "their" fence and nothing was to be hung their without their permission. - Anonymous Reader 8. I had just obtained my first barn and began taking in borders. My husband who is not horse savvy was out in the barn one day doing some projects for me. He noticed that one of our young girls in the barn took her horse out of the stall and began to clean his sheath. My husband came running back in the house telling me that something bad was happening out in the barn and I needed to get out there because this girl was doing something inappropriate. Not knowing what it could possibly be I ran into the barn and stopped dead in my tracks and began to laugh as I looked at my husband. He got a quick lesson in sheath cleaning, till this day he still can do it and I laugh every time. - Willow Creek Stables, Ohio 9. People who think they can go to Ponies R Us and buy the perfect horse, take it home and love it, and all is happy ever after! I had a potential client look our barn, decided she'd buy a horse and board for a while so she could get a few lessons to learn how to take care of one. She soon asked me, "how long do you think it will take me?" She knew nothing about horses, nor how to ride one. "Oh young grasshopper, you have much to learn" I thought. The next Saturday she went to look at two horses she had found on the Internet. She knew absolutely nothing, and I was only able to give her a few brief things to look for at our only meeting. I told her not to buy the first one she looked at and to look at both and compare each of them. I told her maybe even consider looking further because there are a lot of good horses out there especially if you are patient. She called by noon, excited to say she had bought a horse! After she calmed I asked her which one she bought. Her reply was, "I bought the mare!" I asked what made her decide on her instead of the gelding? She replied, "I never looked at the gelding, she's the one, we bonded." And the rest was history... Of course she learned an expensive lesson of why you do not buy the first horse, why you look, compare, look again and if you do not know what you are doing, buy form someone reputable or get some professional help. The mare was an old brood mare that the previous owner bought at a sale and tried to make a barrel horse out of. She did not like to work and was very pushy. After getting dumped twice, head butted while grooming (thinking all the pushiness was the mare saying "I love you", not "get out of my way, and "oh, leave me alone!") I explained that she wanted to be sure her mare knew who the boss was. She thought all horses just let people ride them and that you just pull the reins and they go where you want. She said, "there's a lot more to this riding and horse keeping thing, huh"? I laugh every time I think of the look on her face when she was dumped, fortunately not hurt and was mad at her mare, asking me, "why does she hate me"? After a long serious conversation about safety, knowledge and being a real beginner, she said "I need to get a different horse, huh?" I replied "ya think?." She is now about to survive a year and we still laugh about it. She always says, "remember when I went to buy a horse and did everything wrong?" I eventually found her a very different horse and is finally realizing that having a horse is a continuing learning process... and a lot of work. - Rise-N-Shine Stables, Oklahoma 10. Once we sold a weanling filly and we weren't too sad to see her go as she had had a habit of getting into and out of any corral we put her and her mom in. We'd wake to find her suck between the bars of a pipe corral, or running loose in the aisle waiting to be put back with her mom. A sensible filly, she'd wait for human help and relax as we'd put her back or pull her out of the strange places she ended up... never the same situation twice. Eventually she was weaned and sold, and her new owner came to pick her up for a long ride to Northern California. Less than ten minutes after she left, I got a frantic call - they were half a mile up the freeway and the filly was standing in the manger of the trailer - could I come help? I hopped in my car - knowing full well she'd have gotten herself unstuck by the time I got there, and she had - no injuries. I kind of laughed and explained to the owner that because of the filly's intelligence, the good news was that she wouldn't try it again. I told her that most all horses will get themselves into sticky situations once in awhile, but the smart ones won't repeat their mistakes. The rest of the trip was uneventful, and I got a call from the owner after she'd arrived at the filly's new home. She was laughing as the told me that when they put the filly in her new box stall, the first thing she did, while they were watching her, was step up and hang her front legs over the stall door. Much panic ensued as they pushed her back over and into the stall, and then the new owner said to the stable owner, "Well the good news is, she won't try it again!" - Karen Malcor-Chapman, California 11. This little chuckle happened about 2 weeks ago. My husband and I were working outside and down our driveway comes a fairly new truck (at a high rate of speed). Obviously not farrm people. I am ready to do some yelling to slow down when it came to a stop. Out jumps a young girl and her parents. "Please please do you have a stall to rent?" she is saying. (no introduction just down to business) I compose myself and say yes I have one empty and I will show it to you. "No need" says the mom, "we will take it." (What?) I am trying to calm everyone down and get some information as they just moved from Hawaii and recently went to a horse auction and bought a horse. (OH MY!) "What kind of a horse?" I ask. "We don't know, it is brown" they reply. "Is it a mare or gelding?" I asked. They didn't know and I tell them if it is a mare I will have to make some stall moves because of a stallion that lives here. Still no clue. At this point I am really worried and a little afraid for this girl, but okay, we will take your horse. Two hours later the seller brings the horse, underweight and tired this cute little Arab wonders off the trailer. By the way two weeks of good hay and feed and he was looking like a horse and had a lot of energy. We just shake our heads and try to explain that this is a horse not a dog. Just one of the things here that make us chuckle. - Spring Valley Farm, Pennsylvania 12. My husband Jochen was mucking out in the back stableyard when we were living in Germany, and all of our five horses were gathered around, more interested in curiously watching him than in their food for some reason. His big Hannoverian Pirate kept interfering with his work. Frustrated, my husband whacked him lightly on the butt with his pitchfork to get him to move. Unfortunately, the prongs caught in his tail and Pirat panicked with this 'thing' attached to his backside. He bolted through the fence and made for the laneway, galloping at full speed until reaching the next town (about 1 km. away). On the way there he broadsided a car parked at the side of the road (several dollars of damage!) and must have lost the pitchfork somewhere along the way. About ten minutes later he came trotting back, tail up and ears forward looking pleased with himself and wondering at all the commotion. In the meantime one of the neighbours had called the local SPCA and wanted to charge us with animal abuse, and everyone had gathered at the hole in the fence wondering how to get the horse back. - Schleese Saddlery Services, Ontario 13. Early in my farrier husband's career, I happened to take one of his shoeing calls. As I'm writing down the information of a potential customer, he happens to tell me his name is Roy Rogers. At that point I'm sure that it's a friend of ours messing with me and I start giving him a hard time telling him "Sure, he's Roy" and "So, it's Trigger that needs shoes?" Thoroughly convinced that it's our friend, I finally finish taking his phone number. Later as I relayed this all to my husband, I found out that his name was, in fact, Roy Rogers and he went on to become a customer for many years. Yes, I did apologize to him for giving him such grief during that initial phone call. By the way, he also had palominos although none of them were named Trigger. - Clark Appaloosas, Michigan 14. A farming friend and neighbour of the family decided to pay a visit to our new home, in cottage country, which was over a 2 hour drive north from where we use to live. It was February and we took him out on the snowmobile for a little tour. We had been on the wooded trail for quite some time when finally we stopped for a break. He was quite excited to see flat land and no trees, so he asked, “ what would be growing in this field, way out in the middle of nowhere”. I replied, “fish.” - South Algonquin Trails, Ontario, Canada 15. I manage a breeding and boarding operation that mainly boards Standardbreds as track lay-ups, broodmares and foals, plus weanlings through yearlings heading to the trainers' or sales. This time last year while the boss was away at the sales and I was off for the weekend, two horses arrived at the barn in the middle of the night. Knowing that these horses were arriving, the stalls had been left empty and the trainers/drivers knew they were just to put the horses in the stalls. Come Monday morning when I arrived to do chores the horses were in the stalls but neither mare was wearing a nametag halter. I asked the boss, who knew the trainers, if he could tell me which mare was which. He did so giving me the horses' names after glancing at them in the stalls. So for the next several months we housed these mares. "Treat" was to be housed under lights and to be bred early in the new year and "Smiletown" to be rested before returning to the trainers' and the racetrack. In late January, the boss informed me that the trainer would be coming to pick up "Smiletown" and I was to have her ready. It was a dark and lightly raining that day but not miserable enough to not do turnout for a few hours. So I brought "Smiletown" in from the paddock and within half-an-hour the trainer had arrived. Apologizing for the fact that his mare was still wet, we loaded her on the trailer and away they went. While I was loading the mare, the trainer and his friend had been admiring the boss's Percheron and Clydesdale and only glanced briefly at "Smiletown" as she went past to the trailer. Thinking about the condition "Smiletown" was in, the trainer stopped at my boss's work and said he thought she had lost some weight but wasn't terribly upset as she was a big bodied mare and it could have just been muscle and conditioning. My boss felt this was unusual as I tend to get lay-ups fattened up during their stays at the farm. Later that afternoon, the trainer's farrier went to his barn to put racing plates on "Smiletown". The next morning the trainer got her harness out and was in the midst of harnessing her when he noticed it didn't fit at all. Checking the freezebrand on her neck against his paperwork, he discovered it was the wrong horse. Phoning my boss to complain, I then got a call to try and figure out how the mistake had happened. Luckily I keep good notes on arrivals and departures, and I could tell him that they arrived on the same weekend when he was at the sales and I was off. We came to the conclusion that my boss had incorrectly identified the two mares. Returning the incorrect-"Smiletown", I asked the trainer how come he didn't catch it as I was loading the mare. His comment was that the mare had arrived from out of province less than 24 hours before he too went the sales so he really didn't get a chance to know the mare. His assistant had delivered the horse to our barn. Putting both mares in cross-ties facing each other, I made some pointed comments about how to identify his charges in the future and thus both of us good-naturedly chastened we loaded the correct-"Smiletown" on his trailer and all was well. Due to this mix-up, we started a new policy at the farm. All incoming horses must have paperwork filled in by the deliverer listing name and tattoo. All incoming horses must either have nameplate halters or get a tag with their name attached to their halters. The catch to all this is - one mare was black, the other was very dark bay or brown; one mare had hind white fetlocks, the other mare had two front stockings; one mare had a star, the other no facial markings; one mare was a stocky, round-bodied animal and the other long and lean. The good news is that "Treat" and "Smiletown" had been stalled next to each other so both mares had been under lights and we were able to breed the correct "Treat" as scheduled. - D. Macdonald , Guelph, Ontario Visit www.smartpakequine.com  |
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